CHAPTER XV
Jacob lingered for a month in Monte Carlo. While he found little toattract him in the gambling or the social side of the place, theglorious climate, the perpetual sunshine, the fine air of La Turbie,and a pleasing succession of golf victories helped him to pass thetime pleasantly. He spent a week at Cannes on the way back, makingwonderful progress in his tennis, and from there he hired a motor-carand spent a fortnight at Aix. He reached London early in May, to findDauncey unchanged and his own affairs prosperous. During all this timehe had had no word of or from Sybil Bultiwell. He went almost directlyto his cottage at Marlingden, where he found Mrs. Harris eagerlyawaiting his arrival, and over the supper table, Dauncey and he and arejuvenated Nora talked over that evening when the two men had arrivedhome in the motor-car, laden with strange packages and overflowingwith their marvellous news.
"Life has been so wonderful ever since," Nora murmured. "Dick looksten years younger, and I feel it. The children you can see foryourself. I wonder," she went on a little timidly, as she realisedher host's peculiar aversion to expressed gratitude, "I wonder whetheryou ever realise, Jacob, what it means to have taken two people from astruggle which was becoming misery and to have made them utterly andcompletely happy."...
Jacob thought of her words as he lingered for an hour in his littlesitting-room that night. His own memory travelled backwards. Herealised the joy which he had felt at paying his debts, the evengreater joy of saving the Daunceys from despair. He thought again ofthe small pleasures which his affluence had brought, the sense ofcomplacency, almost of dignity, which it had engendered. There weremany men, he knew, who thought him the most fortunate amongst alltheir acquaintance. And was he, he wondered? He looked across at thelight in the Daunceys' bedroom and saw it extinguished. He looked backwith a sigh to his empty room. He had read many books since the daysof his prosperity, but books had never meant very much to him. Herealised, in those moments of introspection, his weakness and hisfailure. His inclinations were all intensely human. He loved kindwords, happy faces, flowers and children. He was one of those for whomthe joys and gaieties of the demimonde were a farce, to whom thedelights of the opposite sex could only present themselves in the formof one person and in one manner. He was full of sentiments, full ofeasily offended prejudices. Fate had placed in his hands the power tocommand a life which might have been as varied as grand opera, and allthat he desired was the life which Dauncey had found and was living.
Upstairs were the Harrises, sleeping together in comfort andhappiness, the creatures of his bounty, his grateful and faithfulservants. And he knew well how both of those two across the way, whomhe envied, blessed his name. It was a happiness to think of them, andyet an impersonal happiness. He longed humanly for the other and moredirect kind.
Dauncey found cause for some anxiety in Jacob's demeanour during thecourse of the next few weeks.
"You know, Jacob," he said, "in one way I never saw you look so wellin your life. That bronze you got in the south of France is mostbecoming, and, if you'll forgive my saying so, you seem to have gainedpoise lately, to have lost that slight self-consciousness with whichyou looked out upon life just at first. And yet you don't look as I'dlike to see you. I haven't even heard you laugh as you used to."
Jacob nodded.
"I'm all right, Dick," he assured his friend. "Fact is, I think I amsuffering from a surfeit of good things. Everything in the world'slying ready to my hands, and I don't quite know which way to turn."
"Did you hear anything of Miss Bultiwell while you were abroad?"Dauncey asked a little abruptly.
"Not a word," Jacob replied. "Her last letter to me seemed to endthings pretty effectually."
Dauncey spoke words under his breath which were real and blasphemous.
"Can't you put her out of your thoughts, old chap?"
"I think I have, and yet the place where she was is empty. And, Dick,"Jacob went on, "I don't know where or how to fill it. You see, I'vecrowds of acquaintances, but no friends except you and Nora. One ortwo rich city people ask me to their houses, and the whole of Bohemia,I suppose, is open to me. I never see any women belonging to my cityfriends who appeal in the least to my imagination, and there'ssomething wrong about the other world, so far as I am concerned. Weare not out for the same thing."
"I think I understand," Dauncey said quietly.
"I expect you do," Jacob continued. "You ought to, because you'reexactly where I want to be. I want a wife who is just good and sweetand affectionate. She needn't be clever, she needn't be well-born, andshe need know no more about Society than I do. I want her just to makea home and give me children. And, Dick, with all that million of mineI don't know where to look for her."
"She'll come," Dauncey declared encouragingly. "She is sure to come.You are young and you'll keep young. You live like a man, of course,but it's a sober, self-respecting life. You've heaps of time. Andthat reminds me. Could you join us in a little celebration to-night?My wife has a cousin from the country staying with her, and I havepromised to take them out to dine and to a show."
"I have nothing to do," Jacob replied. "I shall be delighted."
It was a little too obvious. Nora's cousin from the country, a verynice and estimable person in her way, was not equal to the occasion.She wore her ill-fitting clothes without grace or confidence. Shegiggled repeatedly, and her eyes seldom left Jacob's, as though allthe time she were bidding for his approval. She was just well enoughlooking and no more, the sort of woman who would have looked almostpretty on her wedding day, a little dowdy most of the time during thenext five years, and either a drudge or a nuisance afterwards,according to her circumstances. Jacob was very polite and very gladwhen the evening was over. His host wrung his hand as they parted.
"Not my fault, old chap," he whispered. "Nora would try it. She hadn'tseen Margaret for three or four years."
"That's all right, Dick," Jacob answered, with unconvincingcheerfulness. "Very pleasant time."
Jacob had endured a cheap dinner at a popular restaurant and circleseats at a music hall with uncomplaining good humour, but the evening,if anything, had increased his depression. He wandered into one ofthe clubs of which he was a member, only to find there was not a soulthere whom he had ever seen before in his life. He came out withinhalf an hour, but a spirit of unrest had seized him. Instead of goingup to his rooms, he wandered into the foyer of the great hotel, in theprivate part of which his suite was situated, and watched the peoplecoming out from supper. Again, as he sat alone, he was conscious ofthat feeling of isolation. Every man seemed to be accompanied by awoman who for the moment, at any rate, was content to give her wholeattention to the task of entertaining her companion. There were littleparties, older people some of them, but always with that connectinglink of friendship and good-fellowship. Jacob sat grimly back in theshadows and watched. Perhaps it would have been better, he thought, ifhe had remained a poor traveller. He would have found some little,hardly used, teashop waitress, or perhaps the daughter of one of hiscustomers, or a little shopgirl whom he had hustled in the Tube,--someone whose life might have touched his and brought into it the genialflavour of companionship. As it was--
"If it isn't Mr. Pratt!"
He started. One of the very smartest of the little crowd who flowedaround him had paused before his chair. He rose to his feet.
"Lady Powers!" he exclaimed.
"Ancient history," she confided. "I have been married weeks--it seemsages. This is my husband--Mr. Frank Lloyd."
Jacob found himself shaking hands with a vacuous-looking youth whoturned away again almost immediately to speak to some acquaintances.
"You don't bear me any ill-will, Mr. Pratt?"
"None except that broken dinner engagement," he replied.
"I wrote to you," she reminded him. "I did not dare to come after theway those others had behaved."
He sighed. "All the same I was disappointed."
She made a little grimace. Her husband was bidding farewell to hisfriends. Sh
e leaned towards him confidentially.
"Perhaps if I had," she whispered, "there would have been no Mr. FrankLloyd."...
Back to his chair and solitude. Jacob made his way presently throughthe darkened rooms and passages to his own apartments, where a servantwas waiting for him, the evening papers were laid out, whisky and sodaand sandwiches were on the sideboard. His valet relieved him of hisdresscoat and smoothed the smoking jacket around him.
"Anything more I can do for you to-night, sir?"
Jacob looked around the empty room, looked at his luxurious singleeasy-chair, at all the resources of comfort provided for him, andshook his head.
"Nothing, Richards," he answered shortly. "Good night!"
"Good night, sir!"
Jacob subsided into the easy-chair, filled his pipe mechanically, litand smoked it mechanically, knocked out the ashes when he had finishedit, turned out the lights and passed into his bedroom, undressed andwent to bed, still without any interest or thought for what he wasdoing. When he found himself still awake in a couple of hours' time,he took himself to task fiercely.
"This is liver," he muttered. "I shall now relax, take twelve deepbreaths, and sleep."
Which he did.
Jacob's Ladder Page 16
